Scientists have found that almost all dogs share a common gene pool after analysing the DNA of hundreds of dogs from Europe, Asia, Africa and North America.

They have concluded domesticated dogs originated from wolves in East Asia nearly 15,000 years ago.

The animals travelled with humans through Europe and Asia and across the Bering Strait with the first settlers in America.

Swedish and Chinese scientists studied the genes of 654 dogs and found a higher genetic diversity among East Asian dogs suggested that people there were the first to domesticate dogs from wolves.

The scientists said in a study presented in the new issue of the journal Science: "Most earlier guesses have focused on the Middle East as the place of origin for dogs, based on few known facts - a small amount of archaeological evidence from the region, and the fact that several other animals were domesticated there," said lead researcher Peter Savolainen of Sweden's Royal Institute of Technology.

A separate study by researchers in the US, Latin America and Sweden said dogs with DNA linked to Eurasian wolves were present in the Americas before the arrival of European explorers in the 15th century.

That suggests the first settlers in America, believed to have crossed the Bering Strait from Asia 12,000-14,000 years ago, brought domesticated dogs with them, the study said.

Uppsala University researcher Carles Vila said the presence of dogs could explain why the settlers spread through the Americas relatively quickly.

The two studies disagreed on when people first started domesticating dogs from wolves.

The earliest finding of dog remains a jawbone from Germany which is 14,000 years old. The Swedish-Chinese research team said DNA analyses, coupled with archaeological finds, pointed to a point of origin about 15,000 years ago.

I have two domesticated wolves. They are totally loyal to the Alpha and immediate extended human family, and very territorial attacking anything living within their designated area. Anything from moles, birds, rabbits up to and including homo sapiens are, and have been, fair game.

I wonder whether there were any such from among the 564 dogs studied. I remember reading somewhere the claim that dogs are likely descended from jackals and coyotes at least as much as from wolves, but the dog people like the wolf idea better.

As for the idea that prehistoric man domesticated wolves, this seems a nasty and unlikely business. More likely, the first dogs were a few extremely rare wild canines who lacked the usual animal fight or flight instinct, and these sought out people when hungary. Increasingly tame dogs would then have evolved, as the friendliest dogs, being best at begging food scraps off of people, survived and prospered. Only when prehistoric human camps already had good safe dogs in tow would humans them had been motivated to select for characteristics of specific breeds. Nobody wants to breed animals which are liable to attack them.

It makes sense. The land bridge has been attriubuted to many different species appearing in the states. The Dixie Dingo looks very similar to the Aussie version. It would be interesting to compare the DNA of the two.

Interestingly enough, all domestic cats- every breed- carry the Tabby gene, meaning, they all have the potential for being born with stripes. Many believe this is their direct link to the bigger cats in the evolutionary chain.

More likely, the first dogs were a few extremely rare wild canines who lacked the usual animal fight or flight instinct, and these sought out people when hungary. Increasingly tame dogs would then have evolved, as the friendliest dogs, being best at begging food scraps off of people, survived and prospered.

Or the humans would kill a wolf, and take her pups, and raise those, which would then be loyal to the humans.

In the fall, the beaters set out and forced the game into a smaller area.

The village dogs were then attracted to the area. They went in and did all the killing; then they ate all the game.

During the winter, when the villagers wanted fresh meat, they popped their cheeks and whistled. The best dogs were those that came running and leaped into the caller's waiting arms where they could be quickly slaughtered.

This was still the custom among First Americanss right up through the late 1700s.

The idea that dogs might do work and not just slink around outside the village gates all day arose in modern times. Ancient man thought of the dog much as modern people think of steak packed in plastic wrap at the grocerystore.

And when Sierra Club representatives speak . . . well, you get the picture.

Maybe we are onto big here. Maybe they are just barking and that's why their utterances seem to have no meaning! Has anyone ever run a DNA test on these folks to see if they are really human? Does X-Files know about this?

I think the known DNA sequences for wolves and dogs are virtually identical. This from about 15 years ago, when a group of scientists announced that dogs ARE wolves.

What human breeders manipulated was neotony. That is, they extended picked wolves who had an extended puppyhood. Generations of that resulted in most dogs acting like wolf puppies (not particularly agressive). Nhey never turn into adult wolves behaviorally. Then there was Cujo . . .

Or the humans would kill a wolf, and take her pups, and raise those, which would then be loyal to the humans.

They might be loyal to you. But my wife sure would not trust those wolves around our toddlers, and I doubt a cave-man-made fenced pen would be strong enough to reassure her. Additionally, and please don't take this the wrong way, I think the village chieftain would side with us against you regarding the safety of raising wild animals. This is part of the line of thinking leading to the idea that early man could not really domesticate animals, so the animals had to come to man pre-domesticated. However, since neither of us was there, we certainly can't know for sure.

About the domestication event(s) I'm sort of one the side of a single event but the evidence can run either way.

"Phylogenetic tree of dog and wolf sequences show that dog sequences cluster into four clades. This result suggests that either wolves were domesticated in several places and at different times or that there was one domestication event followed by several episodes of admixture between dogs and wolves." (Vila', Maldonado, Wayne, Phylogenetic Relationships, Evolution, and Genetic Diversity of the Domestic Dog)

"The earliest finding of dog remains a jawbone from Germany which is 14,000 years old."

Interesting that they got this wrong. Oldest identified dog remains are 14,000 to 18,000 years old from Siberia. And the oldest identified dog-like fossil is 190,000 to 130,000 BP

Anyway thanks for posting this. Now I'm really looking forward to my next issue of Science.

What human breeders manipulated was neotony. That is, they extended picked wolves who had an extended puppyhood.

Our border collie mix does not really behave like a puppy. What she does is undertake, with considerable bravado, the early part of the hunt, in which the prey, whether toddlers or gerbils, is rounded up. However, once the roundup is complete, she is blessedly innocent as to what is supposed to come next.

As to what human breeders did, is such existed there is absolutely no way to know for sure, although I have given my surmise.

Interesting that they got this wrong. Oldest identified dog remains are 14,000 to 18,000 years old from Siberia.

What makes a dog a dog is behavior, not appearance. A dog-looking wolf or jackal is a wolf or jackal, and visa versa. You can't tell from a fossile if a creature attacked small children or befriended them. This is the type of going far beyond all evidence that should mark the so-called scientist who comes up with this stuff as a crank.

By heaping great amounts of affection on our border collies we have managed to (or they have managed to ) train them to want a major affection session each day. In this sense they are not the self sufficient scavengers who could manage a herd for weeks without human help.

Actually dogs are a subspecies of wolves and are not closely related to coyotes or jackals. The difference between dogs and most species of wolves is visible to the naked eye (if you know what bones to look for). Behavior does make a huge difference though and this is why I favor a single speciation event. That aside wolves have been hanging around genus homo for ~400,000 years. If they were attacking children I'm sure the humans would have exterminated them. Destroying a wolf pack is pretty easy.

As for all this being crank, well let's just say the evidence is piling up. This is the life's work of many people and I for one am glad to sit back and delight in what they find.

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